Archer: Midnight Ron

This week’s episode of Archer saw a very unlikely pairing of characters for the show’s main (and really, only) storyline: Archer himself and his stepfather, Ron Cadillac.
Cadillac has made a few cameo appearances in Season 4 but has never really spoken more than a couple lines in each appearance. This week, we get the full backstory on the guy who loves to brag about his six Cadillac dealerships.
The episode starts off with Archer calling all his Isis coworkers in an attempt to wire $1,000 to his bank account so he can find his way out of Canada after drunkenly burning his passport at a casino. Most like Cyril and Lana, laughed in his face but the answer from all is a strict “no.”
After Mallory briefly explains her disdain for her son once again getting himself in a situation like this to Ron, the Cadillac dealer decides to try and save his wife’s son…and help himself a bit in the process.
Though it felt a bit drawn out at the end, it was fun seeing each of the show’s main characters get a chance to tell Archer to get lost when he asks for their help. In a show that was so focused on Archer and Ron, it was nice to hear a few lines from the rest of the cast.
Ron goes to Canada to bail out Archer and to obtain his help with smuggling a rather large sum of money to give to his old gang of friends…we won’t go into details here, go watch the episode if you want to know more! This leads to the two being chased by a transvestite biker gang, goons out to kill Ron and hobo train hitchhikers. Yeah, like I said, you’ve got to watch this one.
What’s great about this episode is that it has all the over-the-top humor of any Archer episode but it also does great work developing the show’s newest and most unused character. Watching Archer make it rain Pac-Man Jones style is hilarious but it’s also interesting to learn a bit about how Ron became the car dealer he is today.
When I first got the sense this episode was going to give a heavy dose of Ron, I’ll admit I was worried this interesting attempt wouldn’t quite payoff. I was dead wrong on my initial reaction because while the episode didn’t have me laughing my socks off, it did make me chuckle quite a bit while getting me more attached to Ron’s character.
Overall, this episode was a big step up from “Legs” and gave fans some interesting interaction between the unlikely pairing of Archer and his stepdad. As always there were some great one-liners like the aforementioned Pac-Man Jones reference and just some great over-the-top humor. When the Season 4 DVD set comes out, this is one of those episodes you can watch again and again.Rating: 4 out of 5 stars